Anticosti Island

Was arguing with my dad over Israel whilst watching TV.

I agreed with the idea of a Jewish homeland, and said that whilst many Jews wanted to live in the Holy Land, many just wanted a land that was safe and free from oppression.

So I said, "I bet there's plenty of uninhabited islands that could have worked" (forget Uganda). So began a search through Wikipedia for islands with a decent land area and a low population.

I found the Falkland Islands (population under 2K) but a bit on the damp side. Canada has a whole lot of islands, but mostly Arctic. But then I found Anticosti Island (just south of Quebec)... and the story in there blew me away....

In 1937, the government of Germany, led at the time by Adolf Hitler, tried unsuccessfully to buy the island. Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King became involved, and forbade the Nazis' plan

Bit more about it @ http://www.journal.dnd.ca/vo2/no1/doc/47-52-eng.pdf

Hitler with a land base 300-400 miles from New York? Able to attack British Canada. Interesting! WI Capitalism won out over National Security?
 
Assuming that Germany could acquire the island...

The moment war breaks out in Europe, Canada (who declared war on Germany as a Commonwealth member) would move land and sea forces in to seize the island and prevent any potential attacks on the mainland. U-Boats may harass the sea around the island for a bit but I doubt Hitler would try and send an invasion fleet across the Atlantic and through the Allied fleet just to get a little island back.

In the end, the major impact of the purchase will be a tiny territorial adjustment at the end of WWII with Anticosti returning to de jure Canadian control.
 
Here's the thing about Anticosti Island: it's in the Lower North Shore, which (apart from Nord-de-Québec and some other areas) is one of the most isolated areas in the province. The Lower North Shore is closer to Labrador than it is to, say, Montréal or Québec City. Most of Anticosti Island itself is swampland (there's a reason that it's both a provincial park and a wildlife refuge), and there is only one village on the island that was originally created by a French chocolatier. For a Jewish homeland, I don't think it could work - it's worse than "pin the Zion on the Eurasia".:rolleyes:
 
I recall some years back my bruder and I discussed how a different homeland for the Jews could have prevented the ongoing Arab Israeli bloodfeud.

He suggested the USA to provide territory. The USa is huge surely they have some land they would be willing to part with. After all they doid not exactly get it through legitimate means. Not to mention unlike the Arabs the Americans in most cases have been on the land less that 150 years at that point.

Of course being Yankees they harp about their territory as badly as the French.
 
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